A Bone of Contentionby Rosemary R.
Braschwww.dissidentvoice.org
November 5, 2004

I
heard it.

I knew I would.

John Kerry said it.

George W. Bush said it.

And myriad others will join
the chorus.

They told us it’s now a
time of healing. But, I don’t want to heal, and I don’t intend to be healed.

“Healing” is merely code
for shutting up and allowing the President to do whatever it is he plans to
do. But we did that for four years.

Four years we waited for
the President to stop rending this nation apart and be a uniter not a
divider, as he promised. Four years we gave him the benefit of the doubt as
to his truthfulness. Four years the subservient press went along with
whatever he and his minions said; there was almost no investigating, no
insisting on substantive answers to important questions, no in-depth
reporting on the effect the Bush administration was having on the country.
And we kept watching.

Now we should “heal”? I
think not. It’s ludicrous to even use that word given the state of our
country’s health care, with 45 million Americans unable to afford medical
insurance.

Possibly, I’ve mistaken the
spelling of “heal.” Perhaps what the politicians want from us is not to
“heal,” but to “heel.” Like subservient pets, we’re supposed to be quiet,
walk behind them, and continue to obey their commands without question. I
don’t want to obey. I don’t want to agree with this President’s immoral war.
I don’t want to quietly accept the unnecessary deaths and maiming of our
good young men and women and innocent Iraqi children. I don’t want to be
forced to stand in a “Free-speech zone” to disagree—about anything. I want
to protest wherever and however I can. It used to be a right under the First
Amendment in the pre-Bush and Ashcroft era. I want to dissent even more
fiercely and disagree more loudly than before. My voice still isn’t being be
heard in Washington. I want my civil rights—I want your civil
rights—returned.

I don’t want to accept that
my liberalism is worse than leprosy. I don’t want to accept that my
Christian, Baptist, background is boiled down to immoral heathenism because
I don’t agree with many of the President’s followers and their views of
religion. And, as a registered Republican, I don’t want my political views
to ever be equated with those who think they have a God-given mandate to
crusade against all who see things differently.

George Bush again says
he’ll reach out to Democrats. How about reaching out to all good
Americans—regardless of their beliefs—who disagree with his first four year
reign of terrorism? The last time he reached out to all of America, he
patted us with a tax refund with one hand and with the other hand swatted
away our civil liberties by shredding our Constitution with the PATRIOT Act.
A second term, with a conservative House and Senate, will give him the
opportunity to add to the PATRIOT Act with even more restrictions in the
name of “freedom.”

No second term “honeymoon.”
Four years was long enough. And, while we wait for the next election, the
war against Iraq rages, destroying lives of Americans and Iraqis while
al-Qaeda flourishes and grows. Our environment continues to reek with
Presidential destruction. Our health care system continues to deteriorate.
The President, more of a “tax and spend” fanatic than any liberal ever was,
will continue to weaken our economy by adding to the national debt he
created. And, most of all, our rights and liberties will continue to wither
under the guise that the “war on terrorism” means we have to sacrifice our
country’s principles, while the upper classes become even richer through tax
cuts and no-bid contracts.

I want the world’s people
(I think God may have even created them—hard to believe he made such a huge
mistake with everyone but us) to see massive demonstrations throughout our
country against an unjust and inhumane war and against a president who lied
to get us into it—while deceiving us about how well it’s going. It’s not
going well—and the rest of the world knows it—while we Americans get the
purified propaganda spoon fed at “briefings” and “press conferences” about
the wonders of a new democratic Iraq by a scared-to-be-called-liberal press.
Read the opinions of the rest of the world about Bush—not America, but Bush.
We need to protest and demonstrate loudly and constantly until the
Administration, the House, and the Senate—ever fearful of not being
reelected—are moved to act. I want once again to be a proud American.

So heal/heel if you want
to—but it behooves those millions of Americans who disagreed before to do so
even more vociferously now. Patriotic citizens need to be the nation’s
watchdogs—we’ve allowed ourselves to be lapdogs too long.

Rosemary R. Brasch is a national disaster family services
specialist for the Red Cross and a former union grievance officer. You may
contact Brasch at espyrose@hotmail.com.